


Sterling

by s_decoy



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Angst, Blood and Gore, M/M, Slow Burn, Trauma, Werewolf Jesse McCree, Werewolves, poor hanzo tbh
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-11-18
Updated: 2017-01-24
Packaged: 2018-08-31 18:34:13
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 7,289
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8589289
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/s_decoy/pseuds/s_decoy
Summary: A mission in London goes south for Hanzo and McCree. Heavily outnumbered and already half-dead, McCree reveals something to Hanzo that he may come to regret.-- An arrow was meant to mark a victim: it cut deep, left a painful wound, was near impossible to yank out if you did not know how. He hadn’t meant to mark Jesse, of course, but the creature had returned the favor: scratches in his pants, red stains, and the vision of the violent attack, worse than any scar, and one that he would never, could never, cleanse from his memory.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> my first overwatch work! i've been writing this in my english class for some time now, so i do hope it's worth the read! enjoy!

Hanzo peered along the shaft of his nocked arrow, surveying the less than pleasant scene slowly playing out in the cobbled streets below him. Old-fashioned lamps placed along the street threw their light onto the slick courtyard, slicing through the heavy night. Fletching from his arrow tickled his fingertips, his cheek, as he followed his target with the tip, marking the back of a security lackey’s head; the man stepped over the bodies of his unconscious and fallen comrades as he edged closer to a crumpled form pressed up against the building across the street. He held his gun with both hands before him, aimed downwards at a helpless-looking man draped in red and leaking more of the rusty color into the slick streets. 

 

McCree didn’t presently appear to be a danger warranting the fear in the guard’s eyes, his anxious footfalls. His broad shoulders were backed up to the ruddy brick of the hotel’s wall, heaving at a slow pace; his dark hair was darker yet with blood and the brackish water of the puddles in every crevice of the road he lay collapsed in. The metal fingers on his left hand were unnaturally still against the ground beneath him. Hanzo’s breath hitched at the glint of McCree’s eyes from beneath the brim of his hat, a glance upwards to acknowledge his presence above. The guard was oblivious, still creeping forwards with his handgun barely a meter away from the agent’s forehead, smeared with blood from a particularly nasty blow to the face that Hanzo had witnessed earlier in the brawl. 

 

His current vulnerable position was entirely Hanzo’s fault, he knew, a lapse in vigilance that had allowed the small security force to overwhelm his partner on the ground, risking their mission entirely. He cursed his mistakes as he held his bowstring taught: the guard below was at point-blank range now. If Hanzo were to miss his mark, make another error, McCree’s life would be practically forfeit, and his loss was not something the organization could afford. If Hanzo were even to hit a non-lethal shot, the open door to the hotel across the street sat immediately to the guard’s left. He could duck inside and out of the archer’s sight before he could ready another arrow. He had only one chance to right his wrong. 

 

A tiny glint of metal flashed to the side of his target, accompanied by the sound of metal scraping against stone. The guard had spotted his enemy’s revolver, Peacekeeper, lying near, kicked it away. McCree grimaced at the sight of his beloved gun scratched against the filthy street. He looked back up at Hanzo, furrowing his brows, encouraging him. The time to loathe the past few minutes had passed- he had to shoot. Hanzo released his leather-clad fingers from the string of his bow, letting the arrow fly at the back of the guard’s head. It whistled past his cheek, arcing towards its target. It fell slightly below the intended mark, but not far enough to save the guard’s life- archery wasn’t an exact science, but Shimada Hanzo was no amateur. The silver tip pierced through the back of the man’s neck, blood spraying from the exit wound as the arrow’s momentum carried it, and its target, forward. Hanzo was about to release the breath he had been holding, as well, but shock did so for him as he heard a shout from the street below. It was loud, almost animalistic, but he knew it was McCree. The archer leapt from his perch on the roof of the building and landed with a small grunt on the road, dashing towards the two bodies piled against the far wall. 

 

“Get it out!” McCree snarled, clutching one arm with the other. Hanzo’s arrow had flown too far.

 

“My apologies,” Hanzo muttered coolly and bowed his head slightly as he kneeled to retrieve it. The arrowhead was embedded deep in McCree’s arm, the shaft slick and hot with the still-spilling blood of the unfortunate guard. Brushing the sharpshooter’s red cape aside, Hanzo braced his arm to yank the arrow free. His skin felt feverish below his sleeve, and McCree gave another pained bellow as the silver tip broke free. He groaned and shoved Hanzo’s adept fingers away, clutching the wound on his shoulder with no regard to the injuries that had downed him in the first place. He kicked angrily at the unmoving body of the guard that had threatened him and it rolled off towards bodies in similar shape, slumped all along the ground. 

 

“Where else are you hurt?” Hanzo prompted, surveying the water-color blossoms of blood decorating McCree’s thigh and stomach, as well as the state of his face: smeared red and cheeks coated with grime. It would not do to have McCree bleed out in the streets now.

 

“Don’ matter,” McCree’s teeth ground against each other as he chewed through the fresh pain, and Hanzo agreed silently. “Radio for pickup. Can’t stay here long,” he nodded towards the downed men that they had fought earlier, cringing as the motion pulled at his shoulder where the arrow had hit. Hanzo did as the senior agent instructed, and Lena’s chirpy voice greeted him with good news. 

 

“Be there in a few minutes, love! Stay nearby!”

 

“McCree has sustained multiple injuries,” Hanzo warned across the comm, “He will require medical attention.”

 

“Not a problem, Miss Mercy is with us! Jesse, just do your best to hold out ‘til we get there, yeah?”

 

“Can do,” McCree seethed into his own radio, huffing out a relieved breath, and the comm line went silent. From what Hanzo had seen, his reaction to his other wounds hadn’t been nearly as violent or vocal, he supposed the shock was finally wearing off. McCree noticed Hanzo staring at the blood seeping out from between his fingers on his arm. “Don’ you worry ‘bout me, Angela’ll fix this right up,” he reassured the archer with a goofy grin full of slightly crooked teeth- the expression reminded Hanzo of a child pumped full of painkillers. He nodded his understanding and retrieved Peacekeeper from its puddle on the cobbled streets. With a swipe of the sleeve tucked at his hip, he wiped away some of the rainwater before offering the weapon back to McCree; as the gunslinger reached to accept it, a shot struck Hanzo’s shoulder. 

 

Once again, the ornate weapon clattered to the ground and out of its owner’s reach. He heard the tiny clicks as it rattled against the stone, echoes of the shouting men bouncing from the street, coming towards him. Too many.

 

Hanzo felt a sickening pain in his gut, as well as the burn from the slug of lead in his shoulder. Foggily, he again recognized a sense of failure, knowing he should have heard the oncoming ambush from a mile away, or at least had some sense to move he and his comrade under cover. He whipped his gaze in the direction of the shot’s origin as he ducked out of the follow-up fire, caught a glimpse of the second wave of guards approaching rapidly. They were all armed to the teeth and, as skilled a shot he knew both he and his partner were, there was no way to take them all out. He would be pumped full of bullets in half a second if he tried to call for his spirit dragons- usually a last resort, it was already too late. Hanzo reached to his lap for his bow anyway, prepared to take as many of the grunts down with him as possible, a look of resolve masking his features as he stared down the enemies before him.

 

His fingers shook as he nocked an arrow, slightly slower than usual: the shot had penetrated his drawing arm. An inhuman growl sounded from his partner behind. He drew back the string and a slash of pain ripped through the muscle of his shoulder, he gritted his teeth and watched his arrow fly, anyway. As his eyes tracked its rapid path, cutting through the chilled air and gliding towards the head of an unsuspecting frontman, a flash of scruffy red and brown caught his attention. A deafening cry, familiar of only a few minutes, forced his bow to rest in awe as he watched the rusty creature attack, bounding on the same track as his shot. McCree’s previous place on the ground was empty, save for the bloody smudges on the cobbles and his carefully discarded stetson. 

 

The world seemed to slow as Hanzo watched the massive creature tear through the unexpecting men, iron jaws ripping through flesh and fabric alike, spilling blood to the misty air. He found himself stepping backwards as he watched the arcs of the liquid in motion, raining down upon the writhing bodies from whence they came. They shot at it, helplessly, screaming and firing unintelligibly into the fray in a desperate attempt to slow the beast. The tables had turned.

 

Bullets struck feet, ate at the road as the gunmen aimed for the thick hide diving through their numbers, tossing bodies aside with ease as it picked off victims left and right. Its wide paws grabbed a man down, its teeth finished the job, though Hanzo couldn’t help but notice that its front left limb ended in something remarkably human; and, of course, that it was made entirely of metal. He held his breath, backing away from the commotion with his bow lowered to his thigh. His eyes were trained to the beast’s broad back, wrapped in a shredded red blanket, its thick fur tinged red from the spill all around. The messy, perpetually squirming brawl began to slow as few men remained standing. Hanzo could tell most of the bodies on the ground were lifeless, fading fast, or the few missing limbs, fleshy chunks: they probably wished they were dead.

 

As the last man went down, the creature turned on its heel and glared up at Hanzo. Golden eyes, molten like liquid amber trained on him, heavy, labored breaths making their motion unsteady. The beast’s scruffy brown fur had become ginger in the fight, soaked with blood and rainwater, sticking to its flank like it had been pasted down. It shook its mane as it stalked forwards, the blood that seemingly could not rest spraying back into the air. 

 

“Jesse-” The name that bubbled to Hanzo’s lips was not one he uttered often. The beast making its way nearer was not simply his mission partner, McCree, not anymore. The wild in its eyes spoke more to the young man, the outlaw, vigilante, the fiery boy that the pre-Recall members sometimes spoke of. They were the ones to call him Jesse. It fit. 

 

The wolf-like beast grew nearer yet. Hanzo could feel its hot, stinking breath on his chest, its wickedly curved claws scrabbling up onto his thighs, pressing him back into the stone wall behind. He squeezed his eyes shut, gasping quietly for air as his heart threatened to beat out of his chest. True fear was not something he experienced often. Calm in a battle of two versus fifty, but the massacre he had witnessed rubbed him in all the wrong ways.

 

Red-stained teeth bared to his neck, flesh-specked claws at his chest, he closed his eyes and only hoped that his end would be quick.

 

“You don’t tell a soul,” Jesse growled. The claws became lighter, duller. Hot, stinking breath remained at his throat, but the threat it carried was less. McCree’s voice wasn’t venomous. He was tired. “Got it, doll?” His human teeth clenched, still stained red and peppered with bits of flesh. The pet name was spit out as an afterthought, something inside McCree trying to upkeep his usual nonchalance. For the sake of chivalry, Hanzo supposed. He opened his eyes silently, observing McCree’s broad hands. His short-cropped nails were in a similar state to his mouth, morphed from the keratin daggers responsible for several dozen corpses piled barely a meter away. 

 

“As you wish.” Hanzo let out the breath he had been holding, slacking against the wall behind him, sliding down to rest on the ground. McCree followed suit, flexing his jaw and hocking a red mouthful of saliva at the ground before practically collapsing into Hanzo’s lap. The archer glanced down to see the man’s cheek pressed to his leg. His warm, wet breath brushed Hanzo’s skin through his hakama pants and the hairs on the back of his neck bristled, unsure whether he should see the closeness as a threat or a measure of peace.

 

“Yer arrows are silver, huh?” McCree murmured, sounding to be on the edge of sleep. His arms and fingers curled into each other, shrinking his form.

 

“Sterling. It is sanitary.”

 

“Stings like a bitch.”


	2. Chapter 2

“Hanzo, I’m delighted that you think so highly of me as a physician, but I would rather wait until we’re back on solid ground,” Angela gave the bandages loosely tied around his tattooed arm a gentle pat, declining his request to dig the bullet out of his shoulder. He grunted in understanding, inwardly protesting as he shuffled back to the row of seats where McCree lounged on his back, taking up four at once. Hanzo watched as the man ran his flesh fingers over the new nicks in his metal prosthetic, bullet dents and scrapes that matched the ones embedded in Peacekeeper’s barrel. He was still a bloody mess: a wet cloth and a roll of gauze could only fix so much, but it would suffice until they returned to the Watchpoint.

 

“How’d the two of ya hold ‘em off back there, huh?” Lena shouted from the cockpit of the carrier in her cheery accent. She could have flown them back to Gibraltar blind if she had to, but her eyes never left the inky sky as it engulfed them mile at a time. “Looked like a real bloodbath!”

 

“Yer underestimatin’ us, baby!” Jesse called back before Hanzo could utter a response. “We can handle ourselves, long as y’all are ‘ere to fix our asses up afterward,” he drawled through an easy grin, eyes narrowing as he stared up at the fluorescent lighting on the ceiling.

 

“Painkillers kicking in, Jesse?” Angela smirked as she noticed his breathing slowing, his hands settling folded over his chest. 

 

“Naw, ma’am, just rilin’ down after a good fight,” McCree mumbled, still smiling, sitting up for a moment to scoot nearer to Hanzo’s place on the seats. He settled his head onto the other man’s knees, tipping his hat over his eyes without a word. His damp hair tickled Hanzo’s fingers, and the archer took a good look at him, finally: busted lip, that was his excuse for all of the blood in his mouth when Angela had asked. More was caked in his messy hair, normally soft brunette, it was stringy and red, yet he refused to remove his hat from his head. What a comfort it must be. Bullet holes littered his serape like they had been bitten in by hungry moths, edges frayed and soaking wet. The largest hole lined up with a wound in his arm, wide and gory where Hanzo had dug his arrow out. An arrow was meant to mark a victim: it cut deep, left a painful wound, was near impossible to yank out if you did not know how. He hadn’t meant to mark Jesse, of course, but the creature had returned the favor: scratches in his pants, red stains, and the vision of the violent attack, worse than any scar, and one that he would never, could never, cleanse from his memory.

 

* * *

 

When they landed back at the Watchpoint, the last true hour of night had been spent. Streaks of salt-pink and a gold the color of Hanzo’s silk hair ribbon spliced between the inky blue and ocean on the horizon, the cliffs dipping into a reflection of the sky. He toyed with his accessory, observing the crash of the waves against the rocks, but there was hardly time to enjoy the scenery as Angela herded her patients towards the medical facilities. McCree leaned on Hanzo’s shoulders as they walked, slow from fatigue and the drugs the doctor had given him on the flight. There was a slight limp to his gait, one that Hanzo had not noticed before.

 

The medbay was always cold, Hanzo noticed. Sterile white walls, beds, countertops, they sent a chill up his spine every time he took that first step over the threshold. Orange paint and the dim incandescence of the hallways and dormitories, he had grown comfortable beneath them in his stay at the Watchpoint, but the stark contrast of Angela’s prim little hospital scene was a place in which he had no interest of staying long. It stank of cleansing solution, though Hanzo couldn’t stand the odor, the good doctor must have come to enjoy the scent after all her breath spent sucking it in. He detested the burn it left in his throat, like cheap alcohol without the warmth in his gut, only the numb behind his eyes. It felt like a bloody nose, and if at all possible he wished to escape its chokehold with as much haste as he could muster.

 

Long before Angela had finished disinfecting, wrapping, cooing over each of the gunslinger’s injuries, she told Hanzo to return to his room, rest up after his quick patches and long night. He declined without words, watching silently as she treated her second patient of the early morning. She gave him a side-eyed glance as he observed her deft fingers clothed in white rubber stitch the scraps of McCree’s skin whole once again. 

 

“You’re awfully social tonight, Hanzo,” she muttered absently as she tied a white ribbon of gauze into McCree’s skin. Hanzo’s eyes wandered upwards, catching on McCree’s face. He watched Angela as she worked, too, tired from the mission but the grogginess from the meds had run its course. The shock had drained from his body, leaving in its wake a yawning, miserable-looking mess. 

 

“Jesse and I have important matters to discuss,” Hanzo replied simply, crossing one leg over the other as he felt both of the other pair of eyes in the room fall to him. McCree’s lips hung parted, perked up at the mention of his name, dark eyes searching Hanzo’s calm features. Angela raised an eyebrow, then looked back to her work. 

 

“What was that?” McCree chuckled incredulously, shifting on his hospital cot to get a better look at Hanzo’s expression as Angela continued. “ _ Jesse?  _ Boy, Hanzo, that’s twice in one night. Gonna give a man the wrong idea!”

 

“My apologies,” Hanzo bowed his head, ignoring the ambiguity of the gunslinger’s tone. “A slip of the tongue, McCree-san.” He recalled one of their first conversations after he had arrived at the Watchpoint some months ago. The thinly veiled malice in McCree’s voice as he instructed Hanzo not to use the honorific behind his name any longer. Hatred was natural, he resolved, from all of his brother’s closest friends. McCree did not want any measure of respect he had to show, for it was worthless in his eye. 

 

“Don’t do that,” McCree huffed, rolling his eyes and settling back down. “You know I ain’t mad atcha.”

 

“I was only trying to be polite,” Hanzo’s mind was drawn to the spit pet name hours previous, the red behind Jesse’s amber glare. 

 

“You go ahead and call me whatever you see fit, darlin’,” He chuckled grimly. “Ain’t nothin’ like fightin’ at someone’s side to bring ya together, right?” If it could be called fighting, or if they had even been at each other’s sides. Hanzo wondered if the comment was for Angela’s sake.

 

“I suppose,” He glanced to the window. Soft light filtered in through airy curtains, faced towards the peaking rise of the sun over the hidden little alcove housing the Watchpoint. It fell on McCree’s bare shoulders, his still filthy hair and the patches of bandages pocking his skin every few centimeters. He took stock of the tired look in the man’s eyes, bloodstained, tan skin in need of a wash. “McCree.” The name was stiff on his tongue, no spark like when he had uttered the gunslinger’s first name in the heat of their confrontation, and he could have sworn he saw a glint of hurt in his eyes as he turned back to watch the doctor work. 

 

“That’ll do.”

 

* * *

 

When Jesse’s medical care stretched into its second hour, Hanzo stood and left. The man was hardly conscious anyway, eyes twitching every few seconds as he fought off the sleep that had come to claim its night still due. He found his way to the kitchen, hallways relatively empty- it was early, most members currently stationed at the base were still sleeping, he assumed. Not all, he realized, as he stepped into the faint wash of light over the counter.

 

A kettle was already full and hot, not the electric one that most of the residents preferred to use. It sat on the stove, whistling as a chrome hand placed two cups next to it. 

 

“Genji,” Hanzo bowed his head in a curt nod as the man turned around. 

 

“Your steps are not as light as they once were, brother,” Genji gestured to the second cup. Hanzo could hear the synthesized smirk in his brother’s voice as he lifted the kettle by the handle, placing a bare metal hand to its steaming backside. He shifted his gaze to the cupboards quickly, opening one to find the tin of loose leaf tea they had come to share. “I heard your mission with Jesse went poorly tonight.” 

 

The archer forced himself to peer back across the counter. His brother’s faceplate was as expressionless as ever, his posture stiff as he changed the subject and dipped the neck of the pot over their cups. Genji had spoken the man’s first name countless times, but tonight it sounded different. It felt different, when he rolled it silently over his tongue. The sound tinged his vision copper, brought him back to being pressed against a wall with daggers at his throat and chest, if only for a moment. 

 

“You heard correctly,” Hanzo muttered, loud enough that he wouldn’t have to repeat himself, barely. “He is worse off than I, but he will recover, I am sure.”

 

“Will you, though?” Genji placed the kettle back on the counter. “You look like you’ve seen a monster,  _ anija _ .”

 

Thankfully, there were no mirrors in the medbay. Hanzo was sure he looked a mess, hair falling from its tie, stained clothes, eyes bloodshot from his lack of sleep. His arm pounded, tied tight with the bandage Angela had given him, and he followed the throbbing with his eyes to the can of tea in his hands. He should have washed them before leaving the hospital, dried blood crusted beneath his nails. He wondered for a moment who it belonged to. 

 

Hurriedly, he passed the tea off to his brother and rolled his sleeves to his elbows, turning the sink to the hottest water it could manage and dunking his hands underneath. Genji watched, tapping a spoonful of leaves into each of their cups as Hanzo scrubbed his skin raw. Both worked slowly and methodically, and Hanzo resisted the urge to sigh in relief as the last of the crusted liquid fell from his fingers. It felt like peeling moss from a tree, allowing it to breathe once again. 

 

“You didn’t answer my question,” Genji murmured thoughtfully as Hanzo dried his hands, passing a hot ceramic cup into his pink fingers. “Are you alright?” 

 

“I’ll be fine,” Collapsing into one of the kitchen chairs, Hanzo brought the cup to his lips and drank. The tea washed over the dryness in his mouth, cleansing his throat of the metallic taste he had suffered through all night. 

 

“What happened?” Genji pressed, leaning across the table in curiosity. His teacup lay untouched before his hands.

 

“Like you said,” Hanzo rasped into his drink. “I saw a monster.”


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> very sorry for the wait, had a bit of difficulty writing this chapter! enjoy <3

After sitting through an awkward silence with his brother, refusing his questions with his lips in his cup until Genji also fell quiet, Hanzo made his way back to the medbay. He had burned enough time, surely, for Angela to finish her work on McCree and let him rest. 

Hanzo wasn’t ready for rest yet. His eyes burned with an ache to be closed, yet his stomach fluttered with a far more incessant need for answers. Slowing as he approached the sliding glass to the medical center yet again, his prosthetic calves felt as if they had been replaced with leaden blocks. He wanted an explanation, certainly, but would he ever be able to look at McCree the same way afterwards? The door slid open of its own automatic accord and his curiosity made the decision for him.

Angela was nowhere to be seen, and a hush hung in the room. There was no heaving of McCree’s relaxed breaths, shuffle of his sheets. A curtain had been pulled around McCree’s bed, and Hanzo took a moment to compose himself before sauntering towards it in his usual confident gait- he had appearances to keep up. A renowned assassin thoroughly shaken after a simple failed mission, without friendly casualties at that, would make no sense. If not to spare his own image, Hanzo told himself that he had a duty to protect McCree’s secret- the question of whether it was out of fear or gratitude he avoided entirely. 

“McCree?” He called tentatively, digging his fingers into the textured fabric of the bleach-white curtain. No reply came, and he yanked the curtain away. 

Hanzo sucked in a hard breath. He poured his eyes over the empty bed, latching onto all the deep brown and red stains spotting the sheets as his mind’s eye flashed to the face of the beast on the slicked streets, the razor teeth and long snout, the piercing hawk’s eyes. The way it breathed in his scent, sizing him up like prey backed up to a wall. Hanzo felt his own breath quicken, he ripped his eyes away from the bed desperately, vainly hoping to find the gunslinger’s scruffy, human face waiting silently behind him. He could practically feel the hot mass of animal cornering him yet again, despite the white of the hospital blinding his eyes- what he saw didn’t matter. It wasn’t important, not as Jesse leaned in for the finishing blow, a single bite to his throat- Where was he? He had lost control, surely, unable to contain the beast that shared his body.

“Hanzo?” He whipped around at the sound of his name, adrenaline coursing through his anxious body, eyes wild and heart beating fast. The doctor’s look of concern met his and deepened as she peeked around the curtain. “I thought I sent you to bed.”

“Jesse,” he gasped in a breath of air as quietly as his pounding lungs could manage. “Where is he?”

“His room, I would hope. At least one of my patients listens to me,” she chided, looking him up and down. A pink flush decorated his face, his hands fidgeted at his sides. “What’s gotten you so worked up?”

“I ran,” he huffed, offering no more explanation. He turned back towards the door of the clinic.

“Wait, Hanzo,” Angela called to his shoulders. He slowed to a halt, glanced over his shoulder. “You know I’m here, if you need someone to talk to. It’s my job, I don’t want you suffering because of any,” she paused, searching for the right words. “Disagreements, that we may have had.”

“Thank you, Doctor Ziegler,” Hanzo metered his own tone, making sure that it had enough of condescending bite to strike her offer down for good. He didn’t need to hear it again, after his coming confrontation with Jesse, after the wounds in his memories were sufficiently salted. “You need not concern yourself with me.” 

\--

Hanzo melted into the hallway. There were no windows down by the dormitories, his only companion the yellow light in the ceiling, warm on his tense shoulders and illuminating his pressure-white fists. He needed this conversation, he told himself, and he was still nothing if not efficient: what was the use of a sleepless night standing between him and the answers he craved?

The soft metallic scrapes of his prosthetic toes against the cement floor were a comforting rhythm as he neared the door. All of the rooms down the hall looked the same, generally, with a few agent’s personal design choices breaking into exception. A poster here or there, a mat on the ground outside. The door Hanzo sought was bare, though he knew when he had reached it. Just above his eye level, pasted smooth against the metal, a name: J. MCCREE. He raised a hand to knock.

The steel was cool to the touch as he rapped his knuckles on it, but his blood boiled behind the skin. Hanzo focused on each breath he took, watching the letters as they slid out of sight, then tilting his gaze up into Jesse’s tired face.

“Hanzo-?” He blinked the sleep from his eyes and squinted in the dim light. “Thought’chu went to bed.” Hanzo was silent.

“Not yet,” he managed after a moment, gaze retreating. They were soft, familiar, none of the icy-hot amber from earlier in the night. They looked downwards as he stepped aside to let the archer into his room, anxiety hanging his neck like a guilty puppy. 

The door slid shut behind the both of them and Hanzo stood still in the pitch black of McCree’s tiny room. He flicked a switch on the bedside lamp and a yellow glow lit up his thick arms and white t-shirt. He had showered since Hanzo last saw him in the medbay, all traces of the mission washed down a drain. If he turned back now, left without a word, surely he could convince himself that what he saw wasn’t real. McCree raised his head and the archer cast the thought from his mind.

“Guessin’ you want an explanation, huh?” Jesse let out a long breath. “Ain’t told nobody ‘bout this since I was a littl’un back in Blackwatch, y’know.” 

“The others don’t know?” Hanzo asked quietly, thinking to the doctor, his brother. 

“Nah. Wouldn’ta bothered to keep it from ya if it were like that. This is our secret, okay?” McCree looked to Hanzo with deep eyes, hopeful. Again, he thought of a mournful dog. He pursed his lips and nodded, he had kept worse secrets in his life, by a small degree. McCree sighed in relief. “Thanks, doll. With that big ol’ bounty over my head, I don’t think I need to give the UN any more excuses to lock me up,” He chuckled grimly, pushing his damp hair from his face with his flesh hand.

“How..” Hanzo began quietly, and Jesse perked at the sound, yanked out of his spell of self-loathing. “How long?” He modified the question at the last moment. They could build their way to that. McCree gave a deep hum in thought, posture relaxed and easy. 

“Reckon maybe, twenty-some years?” He gave a low whistle. “Hadn’t thought about that one.”

“I’ve seen you at night, when,” Hanzo hesitated for a moment. “When the moon was full. You were human, weren’t you?” Jesse’s face betrayed his confusion.

“When was that?”

Hanzo recalled the gunslinger’s silhouette flush against the round moon, tendrils of heady smoke falling from his lips as he watched the ocean beat on the cliffs at the dead of night. He had gone out for a breath of fresh air himself, shortly after arriving at the Watchpoint, but the whiff of tobacco had soothed his sleepless mind all the same. They had both sat there for a moment, Jesse presumably unaware of Hanzo’s presence below his balcony. McCree did not like him, he knew. Not enough time had passed, nor would it ever, between Genji’s reconstruction and his own arrival as an ally of Overwatch. Hanzo remained silent, backing out of Jesse’s potential line of sight and settling on the ground a ways away, listening to the man’s steady breaths, the occasional shift of his position. One of his brother’s closest friends, a wanted criminal but a good man, he had heard from the members less put off by his own general existence. Things he wished for himself, but not that he deserved to pursue.

“Unimportant,” Hanzo answered firmly. Jesse laughed. 

“S’pose yer right.”

“Does it not have an effect on you?” Hanzo prompted.

“Not anymore. When I was a kid, pup I guess,” He flashed Hanzo a grin at his own joke, recalling his days in the deserts of New Mexico. “I’d go wild. Sorta mellowed out since then, learned to control it.” The archer grimaced as he studied the easy smile on McCree’s face.

“Back in London, that was control?” He asked with a venom behind his teeth. “You caused a massacre.” Jesse’s eyes popped in surprise, taken aback, smile washed from his mouth with soap.

“Massacre?” McCree spit the word, digging his hands into the waistband of his sweatpants to occupy them. He sauntered forward, chasing Hanzo back a step. “I killed a bunch’o grunts workin’ for terrorists, woulda killed the both of us if I hadn’t.” Pain brushed his throat as he spoke.

“They were still people, Jesse,” Hanzo didn’t mention how many of those same people he and the rest of the organization’s members killed on every mission, for the good of the rest of the world. Jesse’s explanation wasn’t the problem- the only possible outcomes to their mission ended in fifty dead men, or two. All he knew, though, was the harsh instinct to separate himself from that fact, from McCree and what he had done. 

“I don’t wanna argue with you, darlin’. If you wanna see me as a bloodthirsty monster, you go right ahead,” McCree sighed, crossing his arms over his chest. “Long as you don’t tell no one ‘bout this, I ain’t gonna complain.” He trudged over to the door and hit the auto-open switch with a clenched fist. “We done here?”

Feeling far from satisfied with his new knowledge, Hanzo nodded and ducked his head through the frame without another word. 

“Thought you of all people might understand,” he heard Jesse mutter softly as the door slammed to his back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> just curious, would anyone be interested in beta reading future chapters for me..? all previous chapters have been un-beta'd, like almost everything i write, but i'd like to have a second opinion on this story!!


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thanks to nappi for beta'ing this chapter! warning for a good amount of blood and gore in this chapter and mentions of genji's death.

Red burned the corners of Hanzo’s eyes as his teeth sank into flesh, pulling forth a howl as he ripped his mouth from a body. They were back in London, inexplicably, the same acid rain mingling with the blood on his back, trickling down into the storm drains. He gave another predatory growl as he leapt after one of the maimed men McCree had tangled with, hobbling away on his arms with his stumps of legs dragging in the puddles. Jesse followed, smacking the man’s face back into the street with a huge paw. A pitiful groan leaked from between his broken teeth, a sob wracked from his chest. Hanzo approached regally on all fours, claws clicking the cobbles as Jesse stood by. He knelt and lined his fangs up with the meat of the grunt’s shoulder- not his neck. The beasts had not yet finished their game. 

Bone crunched in his jaw as he closed it, tasting sickly iron as it splashed onto his long tongue. The man screeched, Hanzo could feel the deafening beat of his heart flush against his throat as he tossed the unmoving body onto its back. 

“Anija,” The man whimpered, voice cracking. With Genji’s face exposed, teeth marks and scratches morphed into the clean slices from Hanzo’s sword. The cuts bloomed like roses in their bush’s final spring, vibrant and full against a fading body. Hanzo choked liked he had swallowed acid, recoiling from the near-corpse as it twitched against the cobble street. His wounds were deep, bleeding profusely, violence and malice burrowing directly into the boy’s tattered flesh- all of Hanzo’s deepest regrets on one messy canvas. 

“Genji!” His paws were no longer, claws gone and in their place the blade he had not touched for a decade. Jesse gave up his waiting, with his partner gone- dug his snout into Genji’s stomach, tearing through shirt and skin alike. The boy screamed again, he had always had a low tolerance for pain.

“Jesse, stop!” Hanzo’s own voice felt unfamiliar, softer and less commanding than he recalled. He trembled as Jesse turned his golden eyes on him yet again, Genji having fallen still and silent, ending the creature’s fun. The obedience was gone as he stepped closer, lazily. Hanzo raised his blade in defense, small, pale fingers slipping on the blood-smeared hilt. Tears stung his cheeks, filling his eyes the closer Jesse became. “Please, Jesse, stop,” Hanzo’s bare feet slipped on the stones below him as he stood as still as he could manage. Jesse licked his chops. 

His skin felt ablaze as he looked the great beast in its eyes, innards cold in fear. He knew only of one way to save himself, no matter if he detested the memory behind it and consequences it would have. The cool metal beneath the blood stains of his sword glowed with a blue flame and he glared at the red in Jesse’s jaws, the lifeless half of a body behind him. 

Two dragons surged forwards from the blade, muffling his sacred shouted words with a mighty roar as he slashed. Jesse yelped. They gnawed at him, agonizingly, torturously slowly. He scrambled backwards, no longer such a fearsome beast as his body began to shrink, the terror in his eyes becoming more and more human. A huge gash ran across his face, dripping into his dark eyes, and Hanzo dropped the sword, rushing towards the man huddled on the ground. He pushed at the spirits, dug his fingers into their ghostly blue fur and scales, but they were not sated, they could not be stopped as they swallowed Jesse down, bite by bite. He felt each morsel on his tongue, the spirits sharing their meal with their master, and he spit to the ground. The taste of Jesse’s blood and skin hung on his lips, dribbling over his chin, mixing with his tears. He reached out his hand to him, fingers shaking. With the last of his strength, McCree pressed a boot weakly to Hanzo’s stomach and kicked him away. 

\--

Hanzo awoke with a pain in his gut and vomit already bubbling in his throat. He tossed his thin blankets away and rushed to the tiny restroom his dormitory afforded. The sudden movement whipped him with lightheadedness as he emptied his stomach into the toilet, coughing out bile until he could no longer taste the remnants of his nightmare, the salt of McCree’s torn skin and the sweet metal bite of Genji’s blood. Deep red scars criss-crossed his vision as he squeezed his eyes shut, collapsing to the ground and dry-heaving onto the plastic linoleum. He did his best to focus on the stinging cold of the flooring against his burning cheek, waiting for the dream to fade away like all the others. His brother’s voice pleaded at him from somewhere he couldn’t shut out, an echo of the nightmare, real life, and Genji’s new synthesized cry, all at once. McCree shouted, too, but it was muffled. He heard his name over and over, far softer than it ought to sound from the man he had just accused of massacre. Something warmer than his own feverish flesh ran down his face from the corners of his closed eyes, rounding over his parted lips in a fat drop. Not blood, but salty all the same. 

The faucet was running. When had he turned that on? 

A delightfully cool weight fell onto his eyes swollen from tears and his face was lifted from the ground. He breathed out from his mouth, heaving chest beginning to settle. 

“Hanzo? Darlin’, say something,” McCree’s voice was no longer so quiet and far off. Hanzo snapped from his own dizzy plane of the universe as he felt two large hands rest on his trembling shoulders, slide down to hold his arms in place. He opened his eyes to black for a moment, then shakily reached up to remove the wet towel from his face. With his vision mostly unobstructed, he looked up to the warm body grounding him to the earth, holding him steady.

“Jesse?”

“Sorry for just comin’ in, but I heard you fall, an’ you didn’t answer the door-,” McCree looked down to Hanzo’s bare folded knees, scuffed red from standing on them. 

“It’s... I’m fine,” Hanzo murmured, voice gravelly and sore. He avoided swallowing, tongue thick and sour in his mouth. His breaths remained labored, a slight sheen of cold sweat gleamed on his forehead and cheeks.

“You can’t expect me to believe that,” the gunslinger deadpanned, then gave a light chuckle. “I know we probably ain’t on the best’a terms right now, but I’m not gonna leave you like this.” Hanzo left his lips pursed as McCree’s eyes met his foggy vision. The hurt that Hanzo had shared in the cowboy’s bedroom had followed Jesse through his sleepless hours of the morning, reflected as he studied Hanzo’s slick skin and glazed-over look. With a gentle cluck of his tongue, the taller man wrestled the damp towel from Hanzo’s stiff hand, bringing it back to his face and swiping it over his mouth. “Can I at least make sure you get cleaned up?” Hanzo nodded after a moment to consider, releasing some of the tension in his neck and letting his head topple forward to rest against Jesse’s chest. Jesse grunted in surprise, bringing his hand to Hanzo’s back to hold him steady. 

“Thank you, Jesse,” Hanzo rasped into the cotton of his shirt. 

“Ain’t no trouble, darlin’. Been through a lot today, you’n me both,” McCree hummed thoughtfully, reaching under Hanzo’s arms to bring him to his feet as he stood. His forehead remained nestled beneath his chin, scent of some nondescript shampoo drifting into his nose from Hanzo’s slightly damp hair - from his perceived earlier shower or sweat he could not tell. Hanzo huffed a warm breath into McCree’s shirt and wobbled a step closer on his weak knees. 

“Head is killing me,” he mumbled after another moment of silence, drinking in the comfortable heat of Jesse’s body. “Grab me some painkillers?” Hanzo finally lifted his face and stepped back, cheeks flushed. 

“Sure thing,” Jesse gave a wide grin and clabbered back out into the hallway. Hanzo watched him go, heard his bare feet slapping the cold concrete as he headed for the medbay. Releasing a deep breath, he reached shakily for an empty cup he left by the bathroom sink and filled it, taking a gulp and swishing it around in his mouth. He gagged over the sink, spitting the acidic water back down and taking another drink. With Jesse gone, he had a moment to process his nightmare. The memory was still fresh, stinging behind his eyes, throbbing. Taking help from McCree, breathing in his scent for comfort, felt so wrong after tasting his flesh on his tongue, feeling the betrayal in his eyes as he kicked him away. Maybe he hadn’t called Jesse a monster, but he had certainly thought it, implied it. His words from earlier tasted even worse than his stomach acid - sticking heavy to his tongue like swallowed paste. McCree was no monster. He was not a crazed beast, not a feral dog. If anything, he would sooner call himself one.


End file.
